Misguided
by ScooterTime
Summary: The Muse happens upon a young man lying drunk in a field in Innsbruck. While it has yet to be determined whether this was for better or worse, the universe will never be the same again... it will simply be even more ridiculous. [artwork by Johannes VII]


Wisps of dirty blond hair flicked this way and that around the console, as the pilot checked and ran multiple system scans at once. Everything appeared to be well within acceptable levels across all parameters. Outside scans looked promising, too, which was a relief. The ship had only been out on one real excursion since—well, since the _incident_ that she wasn't going to devote anymore of her brain power to. Stepping back from the controls, the pilot grinned slightly, satisfied she hadn't actually caused any real damage. Well, nothing that anyone needed to know about.

She stared at the console for a moment, then cocked her head slightly and narrowed her crisp blue eyes. _That_ was new. There was quite literally a new switch on her console, halfway around to the other side. That wasn't supposed to be possible. She'd practically reprogrammed most of the Type 71 time ship herself, and essentially took out or tamped down on most of the settings that would account for anything considered "random." But apparently that's exactly what it was. The switch was a slim, faceted, crystalline lever with a deep ruby hue to it, and was actually labeled "RANDOM" in High Gallifreyan underneath. While not all that large, it stood out like a sore thumb against the rest of the more streamlined elements surrounding it.

Even more alarming was the very slight urge to actually give the lever a try. That was a bit new as well, and something she was beginning to think she might have to start getting used to. How utterly annoying. After running a couple hundred calculations through her head, and giving exactly 23 reprimands to the sentient time ship, the decision was made.

The pilot stared accusingly up at the faint teal glow of the time rotor, and gave an exasperated sigh. She pushed up her glasses with one hand, and reached out for the new lever with the other.

* * *

Oh _gods_ , this was a bad one. Yes, this particular round of being drunk was decidedly _mean_. Not only was it making his head hurt far quicker than it should have, it was turning the universe against him in cruel and unusual ways, repeatedly. Usually it was only one of the three, with a possible fourth or sixth option just to spice things up on occasion, but rarely did more than a couple of those options ever gang up on him together. He must have done _something_ to deserve this treatment, but his brain wasn't used to operating very well at an angle. The incapacity to walk anything remotely resembling a straight line at the moment thus prevented him from figuring it out.

Or maybe—just maybe—he was going to have something fantastically _positive_ happen to him in the future, and this was an installment he was paying for now in advance, to even things out in the end. That sounded like a much nicer possibility. It was really a shame he'd spent his last few pounds on beer. He was reasonably sure that at least one more beer would shut up the part of his brain that was arguing the status of his karma at the moment. Maybe two, just to be certain.

In an absolutely pathetic effort to run away from most of the things he thought might add to his rapidly-growing list of problems inside his head, the young man half stumbled, half crawled just past the edge of town. He decided that perhaps avoiding other people for a little while seemed like a smart idea. Attempting to take inventory of his surroundings, his brain and eyes failed to agree with each other on which direction they should point, and his head lolled to the side as he leaned against a nearby fence post. Eyelids narrowed, he spotted a nearby open meadow. Grass, check. Ground, check. It seemed as inviting a bed as any.

Finding a slight depression in the land, he rolled himself over to it, landing with his back on top of the satchel he'd been carrying with him. He was almost exhausted enough that he didn't even care about one of the various lumps inside the satchel that didn't conform enough to the others. Almost. He rolled over once again, and fished out the offending shape. It was that old copy of "The Hitch Hiker's Guide to Europe" he'd borrowed a few months ago. He stared at it. It was dog-eared and well worn. Worn out things were usually comfortable. With some effort, he maneuvered it behind his head to use as a pillow, and flopped back down on the ground.

The sky was clear, and the stars were exceptionally bright tonight. He wondered if perhaps, somewhere out among the blackness, his position might be mirrored by a drunken alien sleeping atop a similarly battered title.

 _Pffffft! Nah._

He tried to wave his hands dismissively at the nonexistent person who was not listening to his inner monologue, failed, and passed out mid-gesture.

* * *

There was a very slight _thud_ in the early hours of the morning, but it went completely unnoticed by the only occupant of the field it occurred in. The sudden appearance of a thirty foot tall yew tree was also ignored. Though there were no obvious edges to it, a doorway opened inward from the trunk, and a woman stepped out, taking a quick glance around her before walking towards the sleeping figure several yards away.

The young man was becoming increasingly agitated. He seemed to be stuck in an instant-replay cycle of repeatedly walking into a coffee table and banging his shin. The table had rounded edges, so it didn't exactly hurt much, but it was starting to get extremely annoying.

" _Hrrmmmurfffnng…!_ "

He opened his eyes, and was surprised to find that the offending coffee table was actually a boot, and that the boot appeared to be attached to somebody. This somebody stopped kicking him and suddenly leaned down with their face mere inches from his, giving him a start. His attempt to jump backwards was foiled by the ground he was already lying on. Full words were unwilling to cooperate with him at this point, so he settled for a pathetic whimper instead.

The face belonged to a woman. She appeared to be around her early 40s, fair-skinned, with dull blonde hair that just fell over her shoulders. Even in the dull star-lit night, he could see that she had a few freckles, and while there were lines near the corners of her eyes and mouth, age appeared to have been fairly kind to her. Her eyes flicked back and forth behind her glasses, studying him, and she tilted her head slightly. The beginnings of a small smile turned up one corner of her lips.

"Yes, I think you'll do. Get up and follow me."

" _Hrrnnnggg?_ " he whimpered in reply.

The woman grabbed his upper arm, and hauled him to his feet. Surprised both by her strength, and being forced to balance suddenly after being woken up from a two-pint slumber, he stumbled for several seconds before retaining a solid enough grip on which way gravity was working. The woman raised an eyebrow at him, but said nothing. She turned away from him and began walking towards a tree in the middle of the field.

"Umm… How long have I been asleep? It's only I don't recall any trees here. I suppose it's possible one snuck up on me, though. It's been that sort of a night…" He trailed off.

The woman said nothing as she reached the tree. She paused for a moment, and a doorway opened up in the trunk. She stepped through it as if it were the most ordinary thing one could do with a tree.

Still struggling a bit with walking and keeping his head upright, the young man stared after her with great suspicion. When the signals finally made it from his brain to his feet, he slowly approached the doorway and reached his hand out to it. Nothing. If it was some kind of illusion, or trick of his still-drunk brain, it was a very convincing one. He bumped into the sides, but managed to maneuver himself inside the threshold. While being drunk likely helped the situation, he still struggled greatly with the sight that met his eyes next.

The woman was standing with arms crossed in a vast, mostly open room, at least the size of a small cottage. The walls resembled the look of a light tanned leather, and every couple of feet there were smooth round structures roughly the size of hubcaps slightly protruding from the surface, a little lighter in shade than the walls. They curved slightly up into the ceiling, which somehow seemed to vanish into itself the further up you looked at it. It appeared to have no texture, and trying to decipher exactly what sort of surface it was, if it even had a surface at all, an effort in futility. The floor appeared to be made of an ivory tile, though it didn't feel quite as hard. In places the floor encountered an obstacle, the tiles became slightly darker, as if taking on the job of producing the illusion of necessary shadows rather than letting other objects bother casting them.

In the center of the room was a hexagonal table-like structure, obviously a control center of some sorts. Its top wasn't flat, but instead raised up towards the center, with slightly concave sides containing numerous buttons, switches, dials, and levers. Most of it was unidentifiable, and the rest still wouldn't have made much sense, had the observer been completely sober. Rising up from the center of this console area was a clear, cylindrical column containing glass structures inside which seemed to form curled and spiralling shapes that ordinary glass wasn't generally allowed to.

Something seemed to be bugging the man, inside his head. It was as if someone was lightly but repeatedly tapping on the backside of his brain with a pen. This was not at the top of the list of things currently confusing him, but it was easily in the top ten.

"Is this what most trees look like on the inside?" He cautiously glanced back towards the door behind him, but it had closed. At least it had the courtesy to keep an outline of itself visible from the inside of the structure, although lacking any obvious handles.

His host stared at him blankly for a few moments before answering. "No, you're not inside a tree. That would be ridiculous. You are inside what many refer to as a TARDIS."

"I've never heard of that kind of tree."

She sighed slowly at him. Tapping twice on the console, a small platform near her fingertips raised up from it, and she scooped something out of the top of it. She must have moved extremely fast, because before he knew what was happening, she was standing directly in front of the confused newcomer. She presented him with a pale green pill and a small paper cup of water.

"Take this."

Most of his intelligence and senses had either completely gone on holiday, or at the very least drastically cut down on their functionality in protest of the current ratio of alcohol to food in his system. The majority had no specific plans for when they were returning. As his common sense was among those that took a leave of absence, he did as he was told without question.

He almost immediately regretted it.

His senses and brainpower slammed back into his skull with such force, it literally brought him to his knees. His eyes screwed shut in pain, and his hands flew up to the sides of his head, gripping fistfulls of dark hair. The noise was almost unbearable, as if every horn instrument ever created was being played at once by people who obviously knew nothing about them, and his eardrums spasmed in protest. His stomach couldn't decide whether to perform cartwheels or drop out of his body altogether, finally settling on doing a dance atop the rest of his lower organs. Whether or not he actually screamed out loud, he couldn't tell. The thing that had been tapping at the back of his brain finally stopped, and made itself a cozy little home in a disused corner of his mind.

As quickly as it started, it was over. When he opened his eyes, he found that other than being drenched in sweat and short of breath, he was perfectly fine. He had essentially gone from still being drunk, shot though a massively awful hangover, and come out the other end in a matter of seconds. He slowly rested a hand on the floor in front of him to steady himself, the other still rubbing his head.

"What the bloody _hell_ just happened?"


End file.
